Quartzsite Roadrunners Gem and Mineral Club
Winter-season rock club in Quartzsite, the desert town of the Pow Wow
- Founded
- 1968
- Season
- November to March; closed April to October
- Facilities
- Lapidary shop, metal shop, opal and multi-purpose shop, craft barn, glass rooms
- Classes
- Lapidary, opal cutting, silversmithing, glass fusing, stained glass
- Field trips
- Weekly rockhounding trips; ATV and side-by-side trips every two weeks
- Show
- Raffle at the Pow Wow, the Quartzsite gem and mineral show
Prospect on your own near Quartzsite
24 gem and mineral spots on open public land with no claim on record, within 50 miles.
There are more on the map, some of them with a possible mining claim.
About Quartzsite Roadrunners Gem and Mineral Club
The Quartzsite Roadrunners Gem & Mineral Club was established in 1968 and incorporated as a non-profit two years later. Quartzsite is a small desert town in western Arizona that swells every winter with travelers and rockhounds, and the club follows that rhythm: it is open from November and closes from April to October.
During the season the club is busy. It has a full set of facilities: a lapidary shop, a metal shop, an opal and multi-purpose shop, a craft barn and rooms for glass fusing and stained glass, and it keeps adding to them. Classes cover lapidary, opal cutting and more, and run all through the season.
Rockhounding trips go out every week, and ATV and side-by-side trips every two weeks, as long as there is a leader. One of the favorite trips is a camp-out at Burro Creek.
The club's biggest fundraiser is its raffle at the Pow Wow, the annual gem and mineral show in Quartzsite, which began in 1967: over the five days of the show the club gives away 140 donated items, one every 15 minutes. The money keeps the shops running and pays for scholarships for local graduates.
Quartzsite gets plenty back from its rock club: road clean-ups twice a season, a clean-up of a memorial garden, a monthly pancake breakfast, Christmas and Thanksgiving dinners, desert cookouts and floats in two of Quartzsite's parades.
Other clubs and places nearby
- Red Cloud MinePay-to-dig · 45 mi
- Wiley Well District Geode BedsFree public dig · 48 mi
- Savahia Peak Rock Collecting AreaFree public dig · 50 mi
- Havasu Gold SeekersClub · 56 mi
- Lake Havasu Gem and Mineral SocietyClub · 57 mi
- Weaver Mining DistrictClub · 85 mi
Where to buy gear nearby
- Camel Mining ProductsOnline shop · 0 mi
- Miners DepotShop · 1 mi
- Half Fast Mining Co.Shop · 1 mi
- Gem World (Quartzsite)Shop · 1 mi